Orchestra
by magewhisper705
Summary: Jack ponders about Ianto and his team during his not-sleep-but-rest time. Rated T to be safe. Jack/Ianto. Set post-season 2, and season 3 is irrelevant. Reviews are much appreciated.


Orchestra

Summary: Jack ponders about Ianto and his team during his not-sleep-but-rest time.

Jack lies back in his bed, pulling the covers halfway up. He doesn't really sleep much, anymore. The team has gone home for the night, Gwen to Rhys, and Ianto alone. Some nights Jack spends with Ianto in his flat, each of the men seeking comfort and pleasure from the other. Ianto rarely comes down to Jack's bed, hidden under a manhole cover near his office. He says it's not quite roomy enough to do what he has in mind, and Jack heartily agrees. But in times like these when there's nothing to do, but sleep won't come, the space is almost comforting, like a burrow. Jack reflects ruefully on the fact that, contrary to what would seem right, he likes small places better after being buried underground for countless years. Ianto sometimes doesn't get it, but just accepts it as one of Jack's many quirks. Ianto accepts everything about Jack, warts and all, and cares for him in his own stiff, reserved and uncomplaining way. But when it's just he and Jack alone, Ianto opens up and shows a side of him few people ever see. Like when he and Jack spend chilly evenings together, and Ianto makes hot chocolate for both of them. Ianto doesn't think Jack notices, but he really does see the way Ianto peeks back into the sitting room of the flat with a slightly worried look, as if he is making sure Jack's still there. Jack is always there, though, and when comes back into the room, Ianto hands Jack a mug of warm hot chocolate and pulls him close into a kiss that tastes of cocoa and milk and sugar and Ianto.

Jack looks at the ceiling of his hideaway and thinks more about the reserved Welshman. Ianto is sweet and warm but just a little bit melancholy, like a violin. But no, thinks Jack, turning over. Violins are too showy, always sounding just a little bit louder than the rest of the orchestra. Ianto is more like a viola. He's always there, not taking the spotlight but making sure things are going well for everyone else. He's soft and warm at times, yet also dark and strong, just like his coffee. Sometimes, when Jack spends the night and falls asleep in Ianto's arms, he wakes to Ianto thrashing and crying in his sleep from nightmares that have plagued him since the fall of Torchwood One. Jack wakes Ianto then and holds him tight, stroking his hair and reassuring him of reality until the panic and fear of Ianto's bad dreams fade. He doesn't know quite what their relationship is, and doesn't really care to define it. He and Ianto will just continue how they are, for as long as they can.

Jack decides to continue with the metaphor and combs through every instrument he knows from Earth during that era until he settles upon one for Gwen. She is clearly a clarinet. They are loud and strong enough that it's impossible to forget they're there, but add some often much-needed depth and emotion to any piece. Jack thinks of the times when he and Gwen clash over anything and everything from the smallest detail to the decisions that could save the world or ruin it forever. Yes, a clarinet suits Gwen perfectly, Jack thought. Especially their tendency to play shrilly and squeakily when not handled right.

Next up, by his order, is Tosh. Thinking of instruments, the obvious choice for Tosh is a keyboard, seeing as the quiet genius had always been at her workstation, tapping out some magical combination of keys that somehow managed to avert doom and disaster, or warn the team at the very least. Up until the last, Tosh had faithfully stood by her computer. But she hadn't been a keyboard. They're too noisy and in-your-face. Tosh had been more like a flute. She always went along quietly in the background but had always swooped in just as the team had needed her, with a sweet smile and a warning or a reassurance. Yet she had risen up to take the spotlight when she'd been called upon, not shirking away, shy though she was.

Jack flips over in bed, fondly remembering the good times the team had, few and far between though they had been. There'd always been some crisis coming up, and it'd been Torchwood's job to manage it for the good of the world. What's left of the team is sticking to that creed, starting again from the end and honoring Tosh and Owen's memories.

Jack pauses, his train of thought interrupted. He hasn't yet picked an instrument for Owen. Something loud, he thinks. He settles upon something almost immediately: cymbals. Of course Owen had been the cymbals. They're loud and abrasive at times, but provide a necessary shock and jolt. Jack smiles at the irony of it. Sometimes the jolts Owen had given were all too real and generally not very pleasant. But he couldn't deny that they had needed him. Jack shifts his shoulders again, trying to get comfortable on the bed. He picks up his last train of thought, which had strayed far from the tracks long ago and was veering wildly into some odd territory.

If the team is different types of instruments, what is he? Not an instrument, surely. He is too weird for any one instrument to embody him perfectly. No, Jack is a fixed point in time, a leader, a conductor, in more ways than one. He is always there. Instruments come and go through time, but the conductor is always there, standing in the front, guiding, watching, controlling. He doesn't only conduct the team but unifies them, acting as a conductor for their individual ideas and talents and skills. He pulls the members of Torchwood together, to create a symphony that saves the world, day after day. Because that's what they are: an orchestra. Sure, they can do fine on their own, but it is together that they do great things, and Jack is the one who keeps them in sync and in tune, who creates and raises and leads and manages their utterly crazy, weird, strange and powerful orchestra. And together they keep the world from falling apart, conductor and orchestra.


End file.
